Access to the occupation of road transport operator and to the international road haulage market

This briefing is one in a series of 'Implementation Appraisals' on the operation of existing EU legislation in practice. Each such briefing focuses on a specific EU law which is likely to be amended or reviewed, as foreseen in the European Commission's Annual Work Programme.

Implementation Appraisals aim to provide a succinct overview of material publicly available on the implementation, application and effectiveness of an EU law to date – drawing on available input from the EU institutions and external organisations. They are provided to assist parliamentary committees in their consideration of the new proposals, once tabled.Regulation (EC) No 1071/2009 and Regulation (EC) No 1072/2009 set out a common legal framework to access road transport operator business and the road haulage market. The different analyses and studies carried out at European level show that the two regulations had positive effects on the internal market (such as harmonisation, introduction of quantitative criteria, clarification of terms, linking of the international cabotage to international carriage operations) and are an appropriate tool to deal with this issue.

Nevertheless, several shortcomings were identified, considerably limiting the efficiency of the two legislative acts. Improvements are therefore needed, in particular regarding cabotage performance, rules enforcement, clarifying problematic terms, letterbox companies, and infringements.

At the same time, harmonising the issues interpreted differently by Member States will benefit the market as a whole. The situations experienced by stakeholders, as well as best practices, could provide useful input for future approaches in this field.

Beyond specific provisions and particular issues to be clarified and/or improved, the existing evaluations show that the most appropriate approach for the future would be a progressive opening of the haulage market and a deeper harmonisation at economic, legal and social level across the European Union.

A joint review of regulations 1071/2009 and 1072/2009 was included in Annex II of the 2017 European Commission work programme (CWP) as a follow-up to an evaluation completed in 2016.

EP: EPRS: Briefing: Implementation Appraisal: Ex-ante Impact Assessment http://www.europarl.europa.eu/thinktank/en/search.html?policyAreas=EXIMAS

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